Journal Quilt Tutorial - Part 1

I took so many pictures while making this that I thought it might make a fun tutorial!

This is the start of a journal quilt.  My inspiration comes from artists Susan Shie (who's artwork I'm kind of obsessed with at the moment) and Ricë Freeman-Zachery (who's blog first introduced me to journal quilting).  I love the bright colors of the artwork from both of these ladies and that is what drew me to what they were doing.  The idea of journaling on my quilt just appeals to me on so many creative levels...so I really wanted to try this idea and make it my own.

Eeep isn't that color just amazing???  I love it!  I am so excited to quilt on this!

I used my Jaquard Dye-na-flow paints and they worked wonderfully.  I was amazed at how vivid the colors were.  They are opaque enough to completely cover the white fabric but transparent enough to blend and create interesting effects with the other colors.

My fabric began completely white!  I used readily available bleached white muslin cut into a small rectangle to play on.  I knew I wanted something with a sunflower or a sun or a similar shape.

I didn't take a great picture but I'm just using an inexpensive fabric pen from JoAnns.  This kind of fabric pen you don't have to heat set - though at the end I did to set the paint.  I wanted something thicker than my pigma pens so I could cover more fabric quickly.  I discovered pretty quickly that fabric is wiggly when you write on it, so I used the same trick I use when writing out quilt labels.  I ironed that whole sucker to a hunk of freezer paper!!!

The pen is not my favorite but it got the job done for this particular project.  Not a ton of accuracy because the pen I used is long and tapered - but the freezer paper made a huge difference.

I drew in the areas I wanted to be bold and anchor my painting.

More drawing...now we're upside down here but it was easier to reach this way!  :)

I used my air brush (once upon a time I used that air brush for makeup!!) but you could use any variety of methods to fill in your quilt.  Fabric paint, fabric pens, fusible applique - I just wanted lots and lots of color!  The cool thing about the Dye-na-flow paints is they don't drastically change the feel of the fabric - they are light enough I will still be able to stitch through this.

Adding more color!

Yay!  Here's the finished result of my painting.  I had so much fun with this.  Next I need to add words - and then quilt it!